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Bulilima fire, 7 August 2022 Bulilima

Out · last measured on 10 Aug 2022

The fire started on 7 August 2022 in Bulilima, Zimbabwe, and satellites saw it burning for 4 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 3,074 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 28th largest in Matabeleland South since 2016 (of 203 with a page). Number 50 in Zimbabwe in 2022, of 346.

We have the GWIS perimeter for this fire, but the VIIRS sensors did not capture it in enough detail: no day-by-day evolution, but the split by municipality is there.

Burnt area
3,074ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
4days
7 Aug 2022 – 10 Aug 2022
Municipalities hit
1
districts
Started on
7 Aug
2022
Danger at start
40
Very high · FWI index

Where it burned

The weather it burned in

29°high
31km/h · peak gust
12%lowest humidity

It had gone 16 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

31% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 832 ha in 2017, 199 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 949 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Bulilima where it started
    3,094 ha
    0.5 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

The weather day by day

ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
7 Aug 27.9 °C 12 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
8 Aug 28.9 °C 13 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 40
9 Aug 27.6 °C 14 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 44
10 Aug 26.9 °C 17 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 45
11 Aug after 27.4 °C 14 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
12 Aug after 27.5 °C 15 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
13 Aug after 27.6 °C 19 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 43
14 Aug after 29.9 °C 14 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
15 Aug after 24.7 °C 7 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 54
16 Aug after 25.5 °C 18 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 51
17 Aug after 27.3 °C 21 % 33 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 42
18 Aug after 29.9 °C 9 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 49
19 Aug after 24.7 °C 14 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 52
20 Aug after 23.7 °C 8 % 44 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 55

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 31 Jul 2022
After · 17 Aug 2022

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Other fires nearby

All fires in Zimbabwe ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Bulilima fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 August 2022 and 10 August 2022: 4 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 3,074 hectares (30.7 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Bulilima (3,094 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 28.9 °C, humidity dropped to 12 % and gusts hit 31 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 45, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Zimbabwe (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

Where to verify it

A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.

Satellite cross-check

Does something look wrong on this page?

This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.

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Where this data comes from

The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.